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RELEGATION. ARE YOU JOKING? 9-10-07
Toby Higgins
Strange, isn't it, how England can't seem to get all of its major sporting teams performing well at the same time. If the rugby is going well, then Lewis Hamilton is sliding his McLaren F1 into a gravel trap; if Andy Murray is reaching the latter stages of a major Tennis competition, then the cricketers are having an upper, middle and lower order batting collapse, innings after innings. And of course, the one set of pros always letting us down are the footballers.
They'll be back this weekend, struggling past Estonia and then Russia, in a desperate attempt to qualify for a major tournament in which they will ultimately crash and then burn out of the competition a long time before one of Europe's so called weaker sides go on to lift the cup and have parades through the streets.
If there is one set of fans who must hate the image of McClaren's Three Lions encroaching limply over the horizon, then it must be our slack jawed Geordie neighbours north of the A1.
Just seconds into coverage of Newcastle's drawn out win over Everton, the words 'Michael', 'Owen' and 'England' were all mentioned in a sentence that also included words such as 'back', 'in-time' and 'for'.
Throughout the entire footage of the game, the emphasis was always on Owen's return not just to the game, but his 'spectacular' return to goalscoring form; despite the fact his effort clearly came off his shoulder, something commentators and pundits alike tried frantically to overlook.
If it wasn't for the fact he is occasionally wheeled out in black and white, there are probably only a hardcore of several hundred Toon fans who know Owen plays for Newcastle, so little recognition they get that he plays for them. Owen is Englands, not Newcastles.
I often wonder whether or not the 'expert' pundits in the boy's clubs on Match of the Day actually watch the games they are supposedly using to demonstrate the years of football knowledge they've acquired by flying recklessly into tackles, heading footballs, goalposts, even other heads, and swearing so profusely at officials that their hairline is beginning to recede fast than the postal service head for the picket lines. Yes, Mr Shearer, I'm looking at you.
Shearer, who, like every striker other than Emile Heskey, has found partnering Owen for club and/or country an impossible task, is a pundit that until Sunday night I actually rated, more for his honesty than he tactical competence. He's fair and appears to see things from a fans point of view; particularly us.
Sunday night however, he suggested that we were 'in trouble'. Relegation trouble, I assume, as he didn't specify the nature of our predicament, and besides, he wasn't the only one to suggest it over the weekend, which makes me wonder if Shearer and his media colleagues do actually watch the games they reflect upon afterwards with solemn, grim looks on their faces.
I was at the Citeh of Manchester Stadium on Sunday as the mighty reds succumbed to away defeat again and clearly I saw a very different game to the one Shearer and chums watched.
The reported poorness of our display has been exaggerated to the extreme, but that's not to say we were brilliant; because we weren't that either. The statistics from the game tell a lot of the story; we had the same amount of shots on target as City in the game (8), one more shot off target (8), the same amount of corners (funnily enough, 8), significantly more possession (54%-46%) and most of the game was played in their half, according to the territorial advantage stats.
We passed the ball crisply and moved well as a unit. The game was lost due to one reason; individual defensive mistakes. Each goal we conceded was easily avoidable.
Richard Dunne shouldn't have won the header that lead to the ball hitting Chris Riggott, and, despite the deflection, Schwarzer should have been able to keep out a tame effort that was straight at him. For the second, Jonathan Woodgate's sloppy pass gave away possession in a compromising position, and then, when we had the chance to clear, Lee Cattermole gave the ball straight back to City, from which Elano was able to score.
The third was a combination of frankly woeful defending from Woodgate, who was presumably trying to play Emile Mpenza offside and Riggott, who presumably wasn't, and from the moment the free-kick was won, Schwarzer looked like he was praying the shot wouldn't beat the wall, as he was never going to get anywhere near it.
While I'm a big, big fan of Schwarzer, free-kicks have never been his strong point. On Sunday, he didn't even line up his own wall; he just stood on his line looking like a nervous first year on his first day of school, while Gary O'Neill lined up the wall from the viewpoint of the free-kick taker.
From the previous three paragraphs, it'd be easy to assume we were all at sea for most of the game; but that just wasn't the case. We had plenty of the ball and plenty of chances, what we lacked was the cutting edge that City had.
The game plan was fairly obviously to go there for a draw, and, had we not made some huge defensive mistakes, it's what we'd have got. We were tactically set up to do a job, and mistakes aside, probably would have got a point against a side who are the form team of the league at home and don't sit third without good reason.
With Mido, Aldaldalidiererer, Arca, Huth and Pogatetz out through injury we're bound to struggle, especially away from home. But put Mido alongside Tuncay or the Frenchman with the unpronounceable name and we suddenly have a little bit of sharpness and potency in front of goal. That is all we are away from being a competent Premier League side. Relegation? Are you joking?
MOTD2 further aggravated me with their post match interview display. I, like the many thousands of Boro fans, want to hear what Southgate has to say about our performance and generally give his reaction.
That the only question we saw put to Southgate was "Having played under Sven, did you think he'd be success in this league so soon?" is a farce. I'm a Boro fan, mate, I don't give a shit what anyone thinks about Sven Goran Eriksson; I want to hear a bit about what our manager has to say for himself. Sort it out.
Same time next week.
UpTheBoro
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A GUARANTEED PROFIT OF AT LEAST £41.00 ON THE FA CUP FINAL
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